A Race Apart
by Lady Devonna
Summary: A malfunction in the iris allows a fugitive from an unexplored planet beset by Goa’uld to escape to earth and lead SG1 on an epic rescue mission. And if that sounds a little cliched it's full of sarcastic comments and good old Daniel ranting.
1. Chapter 1

A/N: Okay, I just recently started watching Stargate, and I have only a general grasp of what's going on at the present. However, by systematically borrowing the box sets from a friend, I know the first two seasons backwards and forwards. Therefore, I'm going to say this happens some time in season two, one of those random event episodes that doesn't really tie in with anything. Any mistakes are the fault of my unenlightened symbiote. Freaking humans.

Carter was staring at several complex equations, waiting for all the nonsensical squiggles to meld in her brain into some cosmic meaning of life stuff. She was almost there when the moment was swept away forever by the door that abruptly swung open, revealing the Colonel and a couple of hovering grunts.

"We have what may be a situation, Captain."

She stood, closing her notebook in resignation. "_May_ be, sir?"

"A state of affairs? Circumstances? A condition? I got more."

Carter cracked a bit of a smile and joined him in the hall. "I was sort of hoping for information, sir."

"Something's up with the iris. General Hammond just sounded irritated, so it's safe to hope we only have to save the world a little today." He held the door to the gate room. "After you."

Shaking her head with a Mona Lisa smile, the Captain spotted Teal'c looking on in what appeared to be great distress. Of course, that was his natural expression, so she wasn't unduly worried. "What's going on?"

"General Hammond says that the computers have crashed. They appear intact to me, however." Sam made a mental note to coach Teal'c in basic technogeek.

"We can't close the iris or dial out until we get them back up?" she guessed. "But we can receive an incoming signal. That could be bad." She looked around for someone who might actually know. "Daniel! Hey, Daniel, what's wrong with the computers?"

Daniel waved and had to maneuver between three uniformed grunts and two science grunts to reach them. "Tried to do too many things at once, froze, and it's being stubborn about rebooting." He shrugged. "And it was much more spectacular than when my computer does the same thing. _This_ is our tax dollars at work." He shook a fist in the air for emphasis.

"Well, it should take ten minutes, tops, to get the system back up, right?" Carter felt an almost unconscious knot of worry relax. A Goa'uld attack in that kind of time window was infinitely improbable.

"The more impressive our technology, the more catastrophic a malfunction." Daniel took on his "about to yammer on indefinitely about the nature of the universe" expression. "I mean, think about it. There was a time when a malfunction meant someone's finger got burned, and that was because the fire gods were angry. The wrong short circuit could literally blow up the world now."

"Yes, Daniel, and we'll talk about that in our group session later," said Jack, who had wandered up looking jaded. "I think we'll make a real breakthrough today. Is this an emergency or are we just wasting time here?"

"Someone didn't have his coffee this morning," Sam said wryly.

Teal'c looked around. "Who?"

That was when the Stargate roared to life, provoking a technician to hurl himself off the ramp in the nick of time, landing on a broken probe. The memory would be funny later. Before his mind even processed the information, the Colonel started barking orders to whoever was in hearing distance. Everyone did exactly what common sense and standard practice told them to do, anyway, but it made him feel better. The science grunts got out of the way, looking consciously not at fault, and the armed grunts immediately struck formation around the gate.

A figure in a black cloak rushed through the open gate and promptly tripped over the hem of the oversized garment, saving his or her life by spilling onto the ramp in a heap of superfluous black stuff as the army guys blasted the space formerly occupied by the cloaked head.

"Damn it, knock that off!"

Sam stared at the still unidentified person sprawled on the floor. The voice was male, and sounded more irritated than anything else. Though he made no attempt to get up or even move, his tirade went on.

"I mean, I of all people understand paranoia, specially in this galaxy, but shooting anyone who comes through your event horizon is a little extreme. Seriously, I'm in no position to hurt you or anyone else. If I _were_ armed I'd have no idea what to do with a projectile, and my swordwork is absolutely abysmal. _Less_ with the shooting! Can I get up now? Oh, and would anyone tell me where I am? I thought I might be insane for taking directions from a necklace and it's looking like I am, but a little information wouldn't go amiss. I'm getting up. Look, there my hands, empty and everything. Unless I were a pyrokinetic of some sort you're perfectly safe. Do you know, I actually heard a pretty report of a pyrokinetic a year ago? From a scientist, I mean. Behavioral psychologist, colleague of mine. Smug, but a nice guy after a few drinks. Information hasn't been flowing very freely since the whole Goa'uld invasion incident, and all, but I've always been very interested to find out if it was true and what kind of mutation could cause that. Oh, I digress. Let me know if I talk to much. It's a bad habit. My wife has plenty to say about that, let me tell you, or she did, before those bastards shoved a damn superintelligent insect up her abdomen. But, yes, about getting up? I'm harmless. Can I? Oh, wait, do you understand me anyway? Er… Kunt u me begrijpen? Pode você compreender-me? Just tell me I'm okay to get up if you get any of this. Oh, come on now, who shot that last one? I was hoping you were out of bullets. Можете вы понять меня? Mag ich oben stehen? Throw me a bone, people."

Jack raised an eyebrow. "Daniel, do you have a brother we don't know about?"


	2. Chapter 2

As usual, Daniel answered, though it was unclear whether he actually thought Jack wanted information or was, in his own wry way, being sarcastic right back. "Well, I suppose anything's …possible."

"Did you understand me all along? Right, that's fair. Am I allowed to stand up now?"

Jack exchanged glances with Carter. An aura of total incompetence radiated from the cowering stranger, but Goa'uld had fooled them before, plenty of times. And Sam couldn't help thinking that it was incredibly opportune that he had run through the gate the while the iris was so temporarily incapacitated.

Shaking his head in mild disgust, Jack held up a hand to the gunners. "Hold your fire. You, hands on your head and stand up slowly."

"Uh, I might need my hands to get up, actually… Yeah, that's definitely broken. I thought I might have hit something on the way through. I sort of had to jump. There's a bunch of rocks around the portal. No worries, I can patch that up, doubt it's more than a hairline fracture. But it's really very painful now that I think of it. If I pass out you can probably just kick me. Just a minute, half a lifetime of medical school and I should be able to fix a cracked tibia." With a pained grunt, the man rolled over and sat up, wrestling out of the cloak.

He looked young and reasonably handsome, in a deathly-pale, angular, overly tattooed sort of way. His expression was dreamy and unfocused, half-hidden by shaggy black hair that seemed to explode any direction open to it, wherever not bound by coppery-looking ornamentation. The All-American Goth Boy fresh from a Celtic Amerindian convention. Face twisted in a grimace of pain, he roughly hauled a bloody, non-responsive leg to a more comfortable angle and improvised a splint with the cloak and his belt in about half a minute.

"Alright, that'll hold. Now, on my head, did you say? Funny, I've always heard 'on the ground,' but your way really makes more sense. You could have all sorts of things on the ground, but what're you going to do, store bombs in your hair? Talk about an occupational hazard. I'm sorry, am I talking too much? Just let me know if I'm talking too much. I'll shut up. Could I get a boost? Not meaning to be a bother, but I was never much for that agility thing. That's my wife's job, really. Was. Either way I can't really get up from here. Oh, wait, forgot to ask, am I in friendly territory? You look pretty military, did I get my lingo right? Friendly something or other, I'm sure of that. One of my brothers is military. Maybe _was_ military, since I haven't heard from him in months. But no more shooting? It's making me all panicky and that usually leads to an asthma attack or two."

Teal'c set down the deathstick of shiny orange doom, strode purposefully across the room, and hooked his arm under the man's, hauling him unceremoniously to his feet. "Colonel O'Neill, this man is not a Goa'uld."

Sam nodded. "He's right, sir."

"Yeah, you can tell? It's kind of a defense mechanism of mine. I just seem too incompetent to be dangerous. It throws people. The downside is I really am that incompetent. Thanks for the boost, my friend, mind if I lean on you a li—Oh dear God and all that is holy you're a Jaffa. Stupid, stupid, stupid. Could have gone anywhere in the galaxy and I get home invasion part two! Last time I listen to my mother about anything. First time, too, actually. Look, if you're just about to hand me over to more of those damn parasites I'm just slitting my throat right now. Or I would if… Damn, lost my knife. Why do these things always happen to _me_? Wait, I might have a razor somewhere…"

Teal'c looked down at the man from the very awkward angle necessitated by the difference in their respective heights. "There is no need to harm yourself. This planet is not in the hands of the Goa'uld."

"Right, because I _always_ believe what Jaffa tell me. That's never, _ever_ steered me wrong. Well, unless you count getting my wife turned into a Goa'uld, my daughters made hostages, my immediate family killed, and my life's work stolen! Was that the right note of sarcasm? I'm not very good at it. And that was collectively the Goa'uld, not Jaffa, so I don't even know what I'm talking about. But you're still… Not nice. Damn, I'm terrible at insults. Let go of me!" The man wrenched his arm away from Teal'c. Without the support, he promptly fell over and was unconscious by the time he hit the floor.

"Medical team, stat!" O'Neill called over his shoulder. To Carter, he said, "Think we can trust this guy?"

"Hard to say, sir." Carter swallowed, looking down at his unconscious figure. "That he's not Goa'uld doesn't prove anything. I mean, the chances against someone coming through _just_ as the iris was down are astronomical, but I can't think of how it could be planned. If I were to follow my gut instinct, I'd say he's okay."

Dr. Fraiser swept in at that. "Infirmary. This looks pretty bad."

Daniel shrugged. "Well, no one likes a broken leg, but is that really _bad_ by our standards?" He seemed to catch the incongruency in his own statement. "But if it's just a broken leg… why did he lose consciousness. Right."

"Do we need to institute a quarantine, Doctor?" Hammond asked, surveying the goings-on with casual disdain.

"You can't catch starvation, sir." Fraiser held up one of the man's arms. His long sleeve slid back to reveal a wrist no wider than a little girl's. "This man has been malnourished _and_ undernourished for quite a while. From his complexion it's safe to guess he's also anemic, and definitely running a high fever. You could say the broken leg is the straw that broke the camel's back, but he was probably on the point of collapse as he came through the gate."

"He also mentioned an asthma attack as a possibility." Daniel quailed under Fraiser's mildly irritated glance in his direction. "…Just trying to be helpful."

"Well, I'm sure there are inhalers somewhere. Come on." She led the medics out of the gate room.

O'Neill turned to Daniel. "Your 'helpful' track record isn't very good, now is it?"

Daniel appeared not to notice the criticism. "Does anyone have any idea what he might have meant by 'taking directions from a necklace?'"

"I believe I can answer that question, Daniel Jackson." Teal'c held up his hand. "He dropped this object when I helped him stand." In his palm rested a small stone on a chain, carved with the dialing code for earth.

Is "dialing code" the right term? I couldn't think of it. Feel free to correct me.


	3. Chapter 3

A/N: Thanks for telling me the proper term, beloved reviewers. Not dialing code, address… Where the hell I get dialing code is another interesting mystery. I simultaneously appreciate and resent the criticism, I'm totally basking in the attention, and will be sure to use the right word in ensuing chapters. Win-win situation; I improve and you get to have _that_ momentous an effect on a total stranger. Or, in Sammy's case, that effect on the girl who has your season 3 box set. Oh, by the way, Sam, I was just watching that episode where they go for Triad, and—Right. Story. I remember. Shut up.

Daniel slumped over the still unnamed fugitive's possessions, collected from what turned out to be dozens of pockets by Dr. Fraiser. It wasn't that they confused him—quite the contrary. A rope, the empty sheath of a knife, a tattered map, a bottle that looked like plastic half full of dusty water… The artifacts were so blazingly mundane they told him nothing.

Jack oozed in. "So… in your professional opinion, what're we looking at?"

Daniel gestured ineffectively. "An eagle scout carries more descript gear than this. Nothing smacks of Goa'uld tampering, but, you know, a rope it pretty useful for tying things to other things without hieroglyphics."

"Well, Dr. Fraiser asked me to show you this." A long pause while Jack dredged the scrap of paper from the depths of his pockets stole most of the drama. "Our guest is talking in his sleep. She's heard him say, uh, _this_ several times."

Daniel stared at the paper for another long moment. "I've heard the name before, but I can't place it… Let me check." He spun his chair around and transferred his attention to the computer screen.

Jack read over his shoulder. "Ahgi sookey taka hi cone?"

"Aji-Suki-Taka-Hi-Kone." He typed furiously.

"Wait, you're just gonna google it? The secret is out, you geek. _I_ could have done that."

"No doubt you could have…" Daniel cleared his throat and read off the page. "The Japanese god of thunder, one of several. He was born noisy, and when grew up he became even more noisier. To quiet him, the gods carried him up and down a ladder. This explains the approaching and receding sound of thunder."

"…_Google_?"

"Now I remember. He's noted for having been offended at a family party, family being the other ancestral kami, um, gods, I can't for the life of me remember what for… He, uh, you have to understand that this is mythology that hasn't been cleaned up for popular consumption to make sense… He stomped on the house where the party was taking place, and this created a mountain that was sacred to him."

"Let me get this straight… You use Google?"

"Moyama!"

"Huh?"

"That's the name of the mountain."

"I'm fascinated, Daniel, really I am. Does Carter just Google her technobabble, too?"

"He doesn't really look Japanese, but there's a lot of variation in the Asian ethnic groups."

Jack tired of talking circles around an oblivious Daniel; even the best entertainment can fail. "A Goa'uld?"

"Entirely possible, though sort of a sissy option. They usually liked more powerful gods. The Japanese pantheon has all sorts of much more impressive deities."

"Good. Don't tell me about any of them."

A private appeared at the door. "General Hammond said to tell you he's awake, Sir."

"Thank you airman." Jack jovially saluted the grunt as he passed, Daniel in tow, still staring blankly at the scrap of paper and muttering disconnected Japanese phrases.

Dr. Fraiser met them coming off the elevator. "Ah, good, you're here. This is getting interesting."

"Do we know anything new?" Daniel asked, pushing his glasses back into position on his nose. He was aware the gesture made him look infinitesimally smarter.

"A lot, actually." She rolled her eyes. "He gave his name as Mimir Jotun. He no longer believes we're Goa'uld pretending to be human because, and I quote, they lack the subtlety to make hospital food look poisonous and taste radioactive."

"Mimir Jotun…"

"Google?"

"Don't be an ass, Jack." Daniel inhaled deeply. "Jotun are the race of gods that preceded the Asgard. The frost giants, maybe you've read about—never mind, I'm talking to _you_."

"Hey! I'm offended now, I hope you realize."

"Most of them were a nasty bunch of destructive trolls, a few joined forces with the Asgard, really a mixed bag kind of race. The god of chaos and evil was a Jotun, but so were some of their most important allies. And, in fact, Mimir was one of those, the keeper of wisdom, knew everything past, present, and future, lived in the palace of the gods and was advisor to Odin."

"So kind of a… super-Daniel."

"Effectively, yes, but I'm hoping no one's going to decapitate me and keep the still living head around for advice."

Jack stopped, watching Daniel and Fraiser enter the infirmary. "Oh… Kay… The list of things I want out of my brain just got longer." He followed them with a nonchalant shrug, noticing no one was around to appreciate his witticism.

Mimir Jotun was sprawled on the bed, looking quite unimpressive for an ancient wisdom god and reading with apparent fascination a trashy spy novel. He glanced around the book and gave a languid wave to Jack's general direction. Jack returned it. "I'm gonna spoil the surprise, okay? He gets the girl and the bad guy loses."

"Curse you."

"I don't care if he's evil. That guy is _weird_." The Colonel leaned over conspiratorily and stage-whispered to Daniel, "So, with that pedigree, is this guy human?"

"Oh, we can be fairly certain of that, although the kind of shape the poor man's in I might have missed something." Dr. Fraiser tugged off her rubber gloves, leaving both SG operatives to wonder, disconcerted, what she'd been doing to warrant them. "Honestly, he seems very nice, if somewhat flakey. I tried to hold him off until the general gets here, but from constant attempts to make conversation I've gleaned that the Goa'uld invaded his planet just recently, and they wanted him and his wife in particular. _Why_ is still up in the air. Ah. There you all are."

Daniel and Jack turned to find General Hammond entering with his usual hail-to-the-chief kind of assurance, flanked by Carter and Teal'c like an honor guard. "Colonel, Dr. Jackson."

"Hello, Sir."

"Hiiiiiii. Sorry. I didn't mean to interrupt or anything. Just, you know, feeling kind of unwanted over here. Not that there's any reason you _should_ want me. I mean, you know, I did show up a little uninvited. Don't like to be left out is all. Then again, maybe I should do a wardrobe check before I go forging any relationships. Shower-mold green isn't my color. Sounds silly, I know, but I'm funny looking, let's accept that and move on. Any way I can possibly appear to my advantage is to be appreciated."

"But it goes so well with your tattoos."

"Jack…" Daniel shook his head, deciding to skip that battle. "Hi, I'm Daniel Jackson, this is Colonel Jack O'Neill, Dr. Samantha Carter, General Hammond, and Teal'c."

"Oh. Yeah. The Jaffa. You know, man, I haven't had a staff weapon smacked into my windpipe in a while, care to oblige? Ooh, that was good sarcasm. Mimir wins that round."

Teal'c raised an eyebrow in a Teal'cish kind of way, and everyone silently agreed.

Another A/N: I never shut up, do I? If you want information on Aji-Suki-Taka-Hi-Kone to make you a more educated and better person, Google the name. My information came from the first two sites to come up.


	4. Chapter 4

A/N: What would you do if you _didn't_ hear from me? Just mentioning. I've seen a lot more Stargate since I started writing this story, so I know things now that I didn't before. Simple enough. But the timeframe is going to get a little more confused, now that Carter's a major and Sha're's dead and stuff that I had no idea about. I haven't decided just when this is happening, basically. On another note, I think Mimir is officially the first alien to use contractions that the series has seen.

"My neck is still bruised there, you know." Mimir swung his legs out of bed, wincing visibly. "So, where am I? All Ma told me about the necklace is that it showed the way home. Which tells you something about why I never listen to my mother. Been in the family for generations. I could never get anyone to try it… Freaking spacophobia… Obviously I can understand it. My own culture shouldn't be that incomprehensible. But, really, people. The scary Goa'uld are gonna get us if we leave? They got us pretty damn well when we stayed put. Not that that proves my point or anything. I think I'm the first one to use it since we chased the snakes out. But where's home? Or was Mommy talking crazy again? She kind of did that a lot."

Hammond and O'Neill exchanged a quick glance, and the General nodded, accepting the burden of seniority. "You're in the SGC, on Earth. This is the planet where humans originated."

"Aw, cool!" He started to spring to his feet, but Fraiser pushed him back onto the bed.

"You stay where you are for a while longer." Her voice was sweet and cajoling, making its usual stark contrast to her Dr. From Hell style.

"You know what? I'm a doctor too. And I say I'm pretty unlikely to faint again for a while. Professional second opinion."

"And what's your opinion about that broken leg?"

"…Not that broken."

"Lie back down. I'll find you some crutches." She began to shuffle through the big mysterious infirmary cabinets. "How tall are you?"

Mimir shrugged. "Uh… Last I checked, two cubits, twelve digits. I don't check a lot. It's depressing to be short."

"That's…" Daniel gave it a moment's thought. "A little over five feet."

Jack smirked slightly. "You _are_ short."

"That doesn't make sense." Daniel paced back and forth a bit to get the linguist juices flowing. "Your name is completely Nordic, you're invoking a Japanese god, using ancient Egyptian Measurements, and tattooed like a Druidic high priest…"

Mimir cocked his head. "I'm sorry, is he talking about something?"

"We're never quite sure…"

Aloof from the madcap merriment of the lower ranks, Hammond turned to Fraiser, who had produced a very small pair of crutches. "Doctor, when can he be released for briefing? I want to know exactly what's going on here."

"Doesn't everyone?"

"I can send him up as soon as I set the leg, sir." She turned to Mimir. "I'm afraid there's nothing to fit you on base. You don't make Airforce physical specifications. You'll have to keep wearing your own clothes."

"Eh, they're not that bad. I managed to steal some new ones just a couple days ago."

"I suggest you all go wait in the briefing room while I sort out my patient." She raised an eyebrow at Mimir in a significant manner.

"You're gonna shine that light in my eye again, aren't you?"

Stifling snickers (except for Teal'c, who was still looking self-righteously perplexed), SG-1 wended their way to the briefing room.

"Ow! Jack, I can _see_ you doing that." Daniel glared across the table.

O'Neill rolled another paper ball. "I know. I hit your glasses."

"Uh, sir? If you could leave your flashback to sixth grade for a moment, I think he's coming." Carter gestured toward the hall. Sure enough—

"But if there's significant naquadah in the specimen, it just won't decay. It's so weird. Useful, for my research, but you keep expecting them to come back to life and eat you, they look so alive. Well, I mean, you know, not _eat_ you, they don't do that. Jump in through your collarbone and steal your brain. Which I'm using, so you can understand how that'd really just annoy me. Irritating! Of course, that pretty much describes them as a species. Scary, evil, brain eating… But mostly irritating, if you strip the snakeheads of all their trappings."

Fraiser stepped into view, head slumped in defeat. "Take him. Now. …Sir."

Mimir tipped forward. "They're still too tall for me… Ah, well. Do I sit here? Thanks, Janet. I would've been _so_ lost. No sense of direction. Wow, these chairs are great. Springy. Springy and spinny." He braced himself against a table leg and spun around three times in the conference chair.

"Jack, do _you_ have a brother we don't know about?"

"That's irony, right? Just checking."

"Ow!" Mimir blushed slightly as everyone looked around. "I hit my leg on the table. Okay, so, checking. You're Samantha Carter, you're Daniel Jackson, you're Jack O'Neill, you're Hammond, and you're Teal'c."

"We _really_ like introductions today." Jack rolled his eyes, feeling too sarcastic even for himself.

Teal'c cocked his head. "You seem to have forsaken your hostility towards me, Mimir Jotun."

"Yeah, Janet explained about you." Mimir sat back in the chair, hands behind his head. The puffy back of the chair almost swallowed him. "You're a traitor to the good side. That's, like, the coolest thing I've heard all day. And you have that stoic warrior thing going that just says 'A movie about me would be awesome.' I may be an action movie nerd, but who do we really like in these things? The token girl who's smart, tough, invariably blond, and tersely attracted to the leading man? The wisecracking jerky guy who's in charge despite apparent incompetence? The little nerdy guy who either gets blown up or captured all the time unless something sciency has to be done? No, we love the guy who shuts up and kicks bad guy ass. Come on, you know I'm right."

"Yeah, I think he's right about that."

"Daniel, tell me you don't know what he's talking about."

"What I've asked you here for, Jotun, is to find out what brought you here, and whether there's any threat to the SGC."

"Well, of course there's a freaking threat. You've got a Stargate in a galaxy full of Goa'uld. But I'm guessing you knew that." He started to spin, caught Carter's eye, and stilled. "Well, it's like this. We kicked out the Goa'uld about a thousand years ago, when we figured out they weren't gods, just arrogant and obnoxious. There're lots of legends about it. Whatever. So, no one really expected they'd come back. We gave Aji-Suki-Taka-Hi-Kone a serious ass kicking. You think they'd know when to quit. But then a bunch of Jaffa spilled through the stargate one day, and two motherships popped up in the sky in case we were thinking of flying away, which we couldn't actually do because the space program bites, but I guess Nirrti overestimated us. It's a real ego feed, being overestimated. So they pretty much took over in a matter of weeks. So Scary Evil Lady with No Fashion Sense got all the leaders together, and asked for names of useful people. Phoebe and I came up. Funny thing, not for either of our jobs. She likes to play with naquadah and came up with a way to break it down really explosively with just some kind of radiation. Don't ask me what, because physics make my brain hurt. And since I've been experimenting on those preserved Goa'uld larvae the university has from when we took over, I learned a whole bunch of stuff they don't want people to know, and I think some stuff they don't know. But by the time the list came up, Phoebe and I had already taken Pallas and Urania to the next continent over, where there was nothing but a bunch of research stations and a growing rebellion. Nirrti didn't like that much, so she sent like a bazillion Jaffa to come find us. She put Pallie and Urie in a jail cell and used Phoebe as a host. They didn't want to use me, because I knew so much about the parasites and might have been able to fight it. Or so she thought. I have no idea what I would've done. So she threw me in prison too, until I'd tell her where my notes were so she could kill me. Except the guards got so tired of me they started skimping on their shifts, figuring I was too much of a loser to get out. Only I did. And they chased me to the gate, and the only address I knew was the one on my Mom's stupid necklace. And… that's all. I don't think they saw what I dialed."

"I got the basic outline…" Carter frowned. "But who are Phoebe, Pallas, and Urania?"

"My wife and my little girls." He reached into his tattered coat and draw out what looked like a piece of cardboard. He swiped the corner with his finger and what could have been a commercial for single-use cameras appeared. Mimir stood next to a woman infinitesimally shorter than he was, dark complexioned and skinny with a torrent of black hair against an immaculate white lab coat. Two young girls, both dressed in school uniforms, posed next to their mother, one holding something that looked close to a small dog and the other staring very intently at a flower. Mimir was there also, apparently talking to the kids. "This was three months ago. Urania's first day of school ever…"

"Where did that come from?" Hammond looked indignant. "Dr. Jackson, you told me you removed everything from his supplies."

"Not his fault. It's really thin and everything. It was in the 'secret pocket.' I just didn't want to loose it." Mimir sniffed audibly. "Sorry. I—I'll be fine in a minute…" He wiped his eyes on his sleeve. "They're in a damn cell! My little girls… And the love of my life has a snake in her head. Just give a guy a minute."

"Take two," said Jack, subdued. "Can I… Take a look at this?"

"Yeah, go ahead." Mimir screwed up his face for a moment, then slumped like a sulking middle schooler. "Goa'uld _suck_."

Teal'c looked over Jack's shoulder. "Your wife is very beautiful."

"Hey, don't ask me, man." Mimir shrugged, looking less teary. "I don't know how that happened either."

"And I believe my son is about the age of your older daughter."

"Neato. Do you ground him? Because Phoebe always says we should, but I say grounding sucks. I was grounded about half my childhood. That's what I blame for being so twisted. Come on, kids are kids. If they're smart enough to evade capture, then they're smarter than me and I don't wanna deal with it, you know?"

Teal'c looked around the table for help, but no one could think of anything to actually say.

Carter suddenly looked up from her garbled notes. "So, wait, you ran…"

"And left the girls. I was hoping I could reach the rebellion. I know it sounds like some kind of dumb sub-lot in a bad movie, but if I could reach anybody… I think they're still alive. Pallas has already had her IQ tested and she's as smart as her Mom and me, and Uranaia probably is too. So the Goa'uld would want them as future hosts. I don't know whether to hope or not…"


End file.
